Unexpectation
by Moonflower 92
Summary: [Slash] Dean and Seamus discover a diary belonging to Severus Snape. Snape-Lupin, Snape-Neville and Dean-Seamus pairings.


**Unexpectation******

**by**** Moonflower 92**

**Pairing**: Severus Snape / Remus Lupin, Severus Snape/Neville Longbottom, Seamus Finnigan / Dean Thomas****

**Summary**: Snape has kept a diary all these years. Someone finds it and reads it. 

**Notes**: Dedicated to Matthew Bonnington for his valiant weekend beta. You're a magna cum laude with me, Mw! Even if the fic is pretty lousy. This is my first attempt at writing from Snape's perspective, and I have doubts over the authenticity of Snape's voice in this story. Never one to work under deadlines, I have further rushed the plot a little to meet mine. For this, and all other inconsistencies in characterization and storyline, I apologize. 

== 

Unexpectation

------------------------

"Now good morning to you," Seamus Finnigan said genially, looking up from his position on the floor. "_Before_ you say anything."

Dean Thomas yawned again, unabashedly, and glanced sleepily into the living room. "What are you doing?" he asked. "You're sitting on the floor."

"Yeh. I'm fixing the loose floor tile over here." Seamus held it up - a square of burnished wood chipped on one side. "Must have come unstuck during last night's wild dancing."

Dean's eyes widened and he advanced a few steps into the sunlit living room. "The flooring came _off_?" he asked. "But we just bought it last month!"

The other man shrugged forgivingly. "We also had a very... wild house party this weekend, if you recall." he said. "Is that why they call it house breaking, d'you think?"

"Not funny. Christ!" Dean bent over to inspect the damage. "I call that pretty shoddy workmanship."

"Well it's only glue, see, I've forgotten the spell."

"I'll give you glue. Hand it over." Dean picked up the square wooden tile. "We're taking this right back to the contractor. Now."

Seamus heaved a gusty Irish sigh. "You and whose army, Thomas?" he asked. A smile tickled his wide mouth. "And dressed like that?" the smile broadened and grew over his entire face when Dean glanced down at himself, and Seamus began to laugh outright at his partner's chagrined expression.

"Come here." he said, reaching up and pulling at Dean's arms and shoulders. Dean dropped to the floor, chuckling, and Seamus stroked him affectionately, his hand sliding over sleep-creased dark skin. "My man's got a hangover." he pronounced.

"Shut up." Dean growled back at him, with a smile. "You were the idiot who kept refilling the wine bottles after we'd run out."

"I just can't forget _those kinds of spells." Seamus protested half-heartedly. "And I didn't think they'd want so much - my God, Snape drinks like a fish!"_

Dean burst out laughing. "You're incorrigible, Finnigan."

"And Finch-Fletchley, dancing on the piano." Seamus continued. He gazed across the living room floor at the dark blue velvet sofa, and his voice softened. "Dean."

"Mm." Dean's eyes were closed. He reached up and captured Seamus' hand in his own.

"That thing you bought for the telephone chair. To spray on."

"'S just gloss."

"Makes it look pretty damned good, I reckon."

Dean opened his eyes and looked across at the oakwood telephone seat. "Yeah." he said with a hint of pride, after a minute. "It does. Pity we don't actually use the phone."

"It's amazing what a good comic-book artist can do for your prospects," Seamus said. "If it'd been left to me we'd still be in the council house in Victoria Terrace. Good thing we're not _both_ healers, hm?"

"Better thing if WhizzHard Comics paid me enough to afford a cleaning lady as well as a new house." Dean replied. "We'd better get up. 10 guests and a whole weekend to tidy up after."

"We must have been mad." Seamus agreed ruefully.

~*~

"Dean." Seamus's voice came floating through to the dining room, where Dean was supervising the vaccuum cleaner.

"Yes?"

"Come look what I found."

Seamus was in the hall, with a large rubbish bag beside him, into which a variety of waste-paper baskets were emptying themselves. He was holding a small leather-bound book.

"What's that?" Dean asked, skirting the rubbish bag to stand next to his partner.

"Looks like a book, eh?" Seamus retorted, absently. "I found it behind the umbrella stand."

Dean glanced over his shoulder at the blank face of the book. "It must have fallen out of someone's suitcase when they were leaving. Whose is it?"

"It might be Neville's." Seamus replied, opening the book and letting its pages ripple freely in the air. "Except that there's nothing written in it but a date on the frontispiece."

"Ten years ago." said Dean, reading the date off the page that Seamus held open for his inspection. "And a rune on the front cover."

"It's a diary." was the answer, delivered in a receding tone of voice as Seamus made off down the hallway. "Let's crack it and read it!"

"_Seamus__!"_

Dean made to go after the other man, but was fatally distracted by the waste-paper baskets, which were trying to empty each other into the rubbish bag.

When he made it to the living room, Seamus was sitting cross-legged on the sofa with the diary in his lap and his wand poised over it. He looked up and gave a sweet, mischievous smile - causing Dean's reproof to fade unspoken from his lips. How could Seamus Finnigan, that smooth, confident and unbearably desirable man whom he'd "found" at Ron Weasley's wedding, be this impish character on the sofa, trying to break the lock on someone's diary? Dean was drawn across the living room floor by the sunlight gleaming on Seamus' soft, fair hair. There was a dust bunny - a remnant from all the cleaning - hiding in it. He lifted the hair in his fingers, it felt like spun flax.

Seamus' green eyes were no longer mischievous but sensual and clear as he raised them to Dean's. "What are you doing?" he asked.

"Nothing." Dean's voice was subdued into a whisper.

They fell together, onto the sofa cushions. Dean couldn't remember the last time it had been so quiet with just Seamus. He felt the other man's arms round his back, and turned a little so that Seamus would have more room on the sofa. Seamus made no complaint but pressed a little more insistently against Dean. He reached up and ran his fingers through Seamus' hair, noting out of the corner of his eye that it caught sunlight like water. Seamus' mouth was as soft as rain.

The explosion between them lifted Seamus and Dean to new heights - clear off the sofa and over the coffee table.

"God in heaven!" Seamus shouted, sprawling on his rear.

"What the hell was that?" said Dean.

"The sofa's on fire!"

Dean reached for his wand, while Seamus, more practically, emptied a pail of mopping water onto the flames.

"Any damage?" Dean asked, using an extinguishing spell to smother the rest of the fire. "What the hell happened?"

"My wand." Seamus picked it up and inspected it anxiously. "...Looks intact. The upholstery!"

"I'll fix it."

"The diary!"

It was sitting in the centre of the singed patch on the sofa, smoking a little. Seamus lifted it off the wreckage, and the slender rune on the front cover seemed to glow for a moment with fire, but the effect faded quickly.

Dean, somewhat to his surprise, had performed a rather tricky re-upholstery spell on the sofa. "I haven't done that one for five years." he remarked, turning back to his partner. "Nifty, if I do say so myself."

Seamus was turning the pages of the little book. "We broke the lock." he said, softly.

The blank pages were filling rapidly with an orderly, upright script, the words running into sentences, racing over the yellowing paper. In a minute or two, the entire diary was full.

The two men looked doubtfully at each other. "How do you think - ?" Seamus asked.

"I don't know. It must have been your wand, giving off some spare energy or something."

"Rubbish!" Seamus said, at once. "I fixed it just yesterday. And let's not start comparing wands, eh?"

"Well then, maybe it was the kissing. Maybe the diary only unlocks itself with love."

"Love?!" Seamus' voice was incredulous. "You call that love?" he pointed to the still-smoking sofa as Dean began to smile. "Back home we'd call that the IRA."

"S'pose it's safe to sit. It's only smoke." Dean tested the sofa with a cautious finger. "Ouch."

"We have to read the diary to find out who it belongs to." said Seamus, retiring prudently to a small loveseat. "I know only women do that, and I know we're gay men..."

Dean shot him a mildly offended look under a raised eyebrow.

"But I'm also wildly curious."

"And shameless." Dean added, settling down beside him.

"Oh, but the other feller doesn't seem to have a problem with that." Seamus made room easily on the loveseat, resting his head comfortably against Dean's cheek.

"Me? I'm only in it for the sex."

A smile spread itself, slowly, like a stretching cat, over Seamus' handsome features.

"'That's what I told Remus.'" was all he said.

"_What?_"

"The diary, potato-head!" Seamus snorted. "It begins, 'That's what I told Remus.'"

"Damn funny way to start a journal. So it belongs to Sirius."

"No, no..." Seamus held the little book out of Dean's grasping hands. "We can't be absolutely sure of that. Look, there's more..."

"Seamus, for God's sake, it isn't decent. Give it here. We've got to post it back to Sirius!"

"I really don't think he'd mind."

"Seamus!"

The Irishman twisted against Dean's shoulder, and pulled both of them down suddenly onto the arm of the loveseat. "Dean."

He ran his fingers softly over the dark beauty of Dean's face - the features that felt like a living sculpture. His eyes, Seamus decided, for the thousandth time in his life, he loved those warm brown eyes best. He even loved the expression of irritation and reproof in them - Dean's honest decency had saved him more than once. With a gentle, fluttering finger, he traced the outline of short, smoky eyelashes as he spoke. "I don't know what's wrong with me. It might be the wine. But I am curious, and I want to look in that book now that we opened it. I promise you, you can wipe my memory afterwards. Okay?"

Dean bit back an obvious retort. "You have no conscience, Finnigan."

"No. But I do have a very good-looking boyfriend instead. D'you think that counts?" Seamus asked, innocently. "And this little set of memoirs doesn't belong to Sirius."

"It doesn't?" Dean looked startled. "How'd you know?"

"Because it says, 'I cannot bear to see him with Sirius Black.'" Seamus replied, reading directly from the book.

~*~

That's what I told Remus. That I cannot bear to see him with Sirius Black. That only the fact of Remus' happiness prevents me from stabbing Black to death, performing something unforgivable on him, or simply poisoning him, which option would probably give me the greatest satisfaction.

I asked him, in the end, to choose between us. Not with the slavish sense of an animal, (which, in any case, I know is already pledged to Black) but rationally, with his mind clear and his heart open. "Think." I told him, indeed urged him. "Weigh Sirius Black and myself on equal scales. Ask yourself which of us does more for you, which of us gives you a better chance of happiness. Of content. Of a good life, even. If you have a mind, Remus Lupin, then use it, and make the best possible decision - for yourself."

Remus didn't say anything at first. But then he smiled a little and said, "Thank you for that, Severus."

I would've gotten angry, but it didn't seem worth it, somehow. Of course, after that clever speech, he did choose... and it wasn't me.

It's my eyes that hurt rather than my heart. What I feel is not pain, strangely enough, but tiredness, as though I have been running a long race and only just finished. I can't see to write clearly, though I have both of my bedroom lamps on. The lighting down here in the dungeon isn't very strong - I fear Filch might be shirking his duties again. Perhaps a complaint may become necessary.

I'll look into it tomorrow.

* Sept 12th 1996

Remus came, very decently of him, to see me today. He asked if I felt better, or perhaps worse, after his life-changing decision of a few days ago. I told him no. I had nothing to say to him, either.

I haven't seen Black about the castle recently, and Remus told me he had left yesterday to carry a letter for the Headmaster. "He'll be staying at the - recipient's house for a while, to help with a few things." he explained. "...I'll be joining him there later on."

I'm glad I didn't show any reaction in my face. I simply said, "How lucky for you." which didn't go down well with Remus.

"Severus, please." he said, sounding almost angry. "You did ask me to choose for myself."

"And you have, haven't you?" I had a cauldron of pickling liquid on the fire, and I had to keep stirring it to prevent it from thickening. "Don't think I begrudge you your free will."

"I don't." he replied - I couldn't see his face, he was standing behind me. "I think you begrudge me far more than just that."

"If I did," I retorted, calmly enough. "You wouldn't even be able to stand upright to tell me of it."

Remus turned away, that much I could sense, with my back to him. "Severus." he said, after a few minutes, and his voice was different, softer, and more familiar to my ears. "I may have chosen to stay with Sirius and I don't blame you for anything that you might feel as a result. In the end, I did choose with my mind, rationally. As much as I may have wanted to come to you, I don't think I can survive very long without Sirius, given the nature of our physical bond. Even if I were living with you, married to you, I would have required his... presence from time to time. Some problems might have arisen there." he said, dryly.

"I'm sure."

He continued more forcefully, stung, I think, by my remarks. "But I'm not going to deny, ever, that the time we spent together was..." he trailed off.

I stirred the pickling liquid. It smelled frothy and somewhat acidic.

"Was the most wonderful period in my life. I don't think I will ever know such peace again, not even with Sirius." he went on, quietly. And this time I felt him place his hands on my back - I felt him rest his head against my shoulderblades.

And like a fool I kept stirring the damned pickling liquid. Even after he went away, and I lost the sensation of his forehead, his palms, on the back of my robes, I kept stirring my cauldron, staring at the yellow liquid and wanting to climb into the pot and let it boil.

* Sept 18th

Remus left today for Sirius Black's hiding place. His mission might take months to complete, so it is likely that I will not meet him again for a long time. I presume it will be better this way. I have to get used to living alone again.

I had to throw out all the pickling liquid from last week, as it had become unusable from being boiled too long. This is irritating - I had needed it for a class on preservation potions (Year Four, New Syllabus 2A) and now I will have to make up a fresh cauldron, possibly incurring needless expense and certainly wasting a whole afternoon of my time. Another grudge to hold against Remus Lupin...

* Sept 19th.

Remus is killing me. He knows that I heal best when left in anger. Yet he left me with kind, mocking words, and worse, with bitter memories. "The only peace I've ever known, Severus!" cried the miserable little animal. "Most wonderful time in my life!" and then "Goodbye, I'm off to marry Sirius anyway."

I had made him a traveling-cauldron of wolfsbane to take along for this month. Now I wish I'd put an exfoliant curse in it, so that all the bastard's hair falls out when he transforms.

I should share these thoughts with my students one of these days.

* Sept 24th

I am running a high temperature and have been confined to my chambers this weekend. Pomfrey assures me that it is a virus which has been making its way through the school all week. I must have caught it from one of the fourth year students - I shouldn't be surprised if it was that idiot Longbottom.

Again, this is highly irritating and inconvenient. I had planned on carrying out a few more experiments for the Headmaster on truth serums. I have already noticed one or two interesting anomalies in the results for my previous research and there is much scope, in fact a desperate need, for further experimentation, especially at this time. I also - who does not in this benighted institution - have several score homework essays to mark before Monday.

My fever was unexpected. I had not noticed it coming on, and I usually sense any changes in my health almost before they occur. Perhaps this time I was too preoccupied with my work. I had managed to conduct an estimable number of new experiments before the fever struck. The Headmaster, of course, suggested that I might have been overdoing it. I could almost swear Filch has been shirking again - the light seems to be fading. I can barely write.

* Sept 26th

I dreamed of Remus Lupin all through my illness. The most terrible nightmares and the sweetest memories were all intermixed, leaving me exhausted every time I came round.

It is true, I will admit it now: they were the most wonderful days of my life. There.

The most persistent dream was a memory of the first night, the night I caught Remus. I'd been sitting in that run-down cottage for three weeks without anything more than a second-hand sighting of him to show for it. I still remember feeling angry that I'd gone so far as to buy the place just because it was in the vicinity of Remus' last appearance. And it was drizzling. I turned on a lamp, opened my utterly boring book to the last page I'd read (Definitive Taxonomy of Eastern European Herbs - highly recommendable).

It was quite late before I heard the faint knocking at the door, and even then I wasn't sure what it was. Because I wanted to leave everything open for Remus, to make it easier for him to come if he wanted, I had refrained from putting a ward on the cottage. The knocking thus could have come from anybody - and it was a deserted spot in a rural area. Exactly what Remus wanted, of course. So I armed myself with wand, and cautiously opened the door.

My first thought on seeing the sprawled, dark shape on the steps was that it was a Lethifold. But these only attack when one is fully asleep. When I turned it over with a foot, my second thought was that it was in fact a vampire, hollow-cheeked, emaciated and quite ghastly. But it tried to cover its face when it saw me, and whimpered and turned away, so it was Remus after all.

In retrospect, there are no words to describe the sensation of finding something so utterly precious. Of gathering it into your arms, and bringing it in from the wet and dark and cold. Of making everything warm and welcoming for it - even yourself. I only remembered stoking the fire and laying Remus on some blankets in front of it. He kept his eyes rigidly open, aware of but indifferent to the fact that it was I who was undressing him and wiping him down, and drying him with a towel. I who wrapped him up in warm clothes - my own robes, my newest - and I who bandaged and healed the cuts, bruises and sores on his body. I was gentle with him, and I don't think it hurt him.

I actually made hot broth without burning the cauldron. I laid his head on my knee, and fed it into him in spoonsful. I cleaned him when he threw it up. I tried again.

In my dream, I could vividly recollect the mixture of relief, tenderness and sheer awe I felt when I put him to bed. I sat up with him, ensuring he was well covered and wrapped up, and I fell asleep lying on top of the blankets, curled beside him with my head pillowed next to his.

That, in fact, proved to be the beginning of those "wonderful" days of "peace" we both remember so fondly. Although we were both - to varying extents - also emotionally and mentally disturbed. Remus was still in shock from losing Black to Azkaban, and from losing their home, which had been burnt down by a mob soon after Black's imprisonment. His enforced vagrancy had also taken a severe physical toll, and for a whole week I fed him by hand.

On my part, I will admit that the need for Remus more or less overwhelmed me. I was lonely then - hated on both sides despite doing what I felt to be right - and I had watched from the sidelines as Remus took himself to Sirius Black, moved in with him and enjoyed all the intimacy and privilege which I longed for myself. Everything I had ever wanted to experience with Remus. There was also more than a suspicion of guilt over my own role in Black's condemnation, which was responsible for Remus' current plight.

For Remus, things were very different. He was not the supplicant, as I was, begging wordlessly (or at least as far as my pride would allow) for just one chance to be with him. Although Remus was now an outcast, he had not at first chosen to be - his role something like that of a fallen prince. Stripped of Sirius Black and all that Black meant to him, such as love, companionship, legal protection, and financial security. He knew that I loved him - and had loved him from school - and that I wanted (indeed needed) to care for him. His coming to me, allowing himself to be taken in, was his way of bowing to an unkind fate, and giving permission for me to enter his life and atone for whatever I had done to him.

The first week was spent in nearly complete - and satisfying - silence. I do not enjoy idle conversation, and Remus seemed almost to be in a trance. So we adjusted to each other's presence, without words, until it suited us to speak. There was only one bed - Remus occupied it, and I slept outside the coverlet, on top of the blankets. I looked after the cooking and cleaning, and looked after Remus.

In my dream, I recalled the slow process of our acclimatization to one another. The first time Remus managed to get out of bed he stood shakily by the window, holding onto the back of a chair. I wanted to hold him - but I refrained out of the knowledge that he would not like me to take this first minor accomplishment from him. Instead I stood in the shadow of the doorway, watching him silently. Remus was looking out the window, at the truly unpleasant weather (we had just had a violent summer storm) and at the inhospitable terrain he had been living in for the last few months. He was so thin I could see the veins in his hand as he pushed the curtain further back. He seemed to be trying to absorb the entire countryside through the window, from its vaguely-outlined purple and white mountaintops to the soft, gloomy menace of the woods close at hand. I do not purport to know what went through his mind, or what he was thinking about as he stood there, still weak with his illness and privation. Robbed of his lover. Abandoned by the social and legal network that should have protected him. All I know is that when Remus finally turned from the window, he was very tired... and he allowed me to come forward, and hold him as I helped him back to bed.

The first words he spoke to me - apart from short, thoroughly utilitarian phrases - were "I don't know why you are doing this Severus, but I doubt - appearances notwithstanding - that it's for my benefit."

I was cutting vegetables for the pot, and was so startled to hear him speak that I cut my thumb open involuntarily. Stung not just by the pain of this injury, but also by his words, I immediately opened my mouth to defend myself, but Remus forestalled me. "No, don't tell me anything about me - or you. I'm not sure I'd believe anything you said on that subject."

He was sitting up in bed, resting against the pillows. "I'm told you wouldn't even look at the application Sirius made to have his possessions transferred to my name before he was taken to Azkaban. You were the last person to see him before he was transported, and you didn't take the letters he had prepared for me, and for the tribunal. Is that true?"

I was forced to stop a moment to think. "No." I said. "He himself decided at the last moment not to send them to you."

Remus was looking at me with the clear, expressionless gaze of one who has relinquished trust and hope. He said, "That may be so. But that episode, out of all the others, is what convinces me that you have some motive-"

"Remus-"

"_Other_ than your usual desire for possession, in taking me up and being nice to me this way." he continued.

Which of course, was nicely designed to needle me into fury. "Can I remind you, Lupin, that it was _you who deigned to grace this cottage with your presence. That it was you who kept me dancing after you through half of Mongolia and _all_ of Siberia for these last three months?" I asked him, through my teeth. "That in fact, I now own this miserable goat of a hovel because it's the only human habitation within ten miles of you?"_

"At least you own something." he snapped back.

And then, after a slightly painful pause. "Unfair." he conceded. He drew a breath. "I'm sorry. Severus, I truly am."

He looked up at me, and it was at that crucial juncture that my dream dissolved into a melange of wild images and sensations. Of Remus looking at me like that, for the first time. Of the evening spent sitting near him by the fire, gradually coming close enough to each other to whisper our conversation. The professional pleasure in watching his wounds and injuries heal firmly. Pressing bandages, mixing unguent, brewing potions for Remus. Kissing him foolishly and wildly in the night. Smuggling him back into civilization, like a pirate with a gold bullion trove. Grinning idiotically at him first thing in the mornings - like a fool.

In my illness, and my stupid delirium, I recalled every single second I had been near Remus Lupin for those 24 heady months of belonging and of pleasure which followed our meeting on the cottage doorsteps. Every single bloody second of his presence and every last moment of joy, every touch of his hand, his lips, his skin. Every last note of his voice, calling my name with love, anger, companionship, curiosity, and a marvellous, overwhelming possessiveness.

The only good thing about the whole business was that Pomfrey wasn't there to hear me.

* October 8th

The Headmaster tells me that some of my experiments with veritaserum are showing results that no one had expected to see. In fact, he himself was quite surprised to read the report I handed to him yesterday. "The truth - pardon my pun - Severus, is that somehow this potential for extending the serum's life which you've discovered might prove crucial in the scientific engagement against Voldemort." he told me. "And I would certainly hope you intend to discover a process for making this possible in the end."

Which I didn't need _him_ to tell me as I have already sent an expurgated copy of the report to the Ministry, along with a demand for funding and research facilities.

The Headmaster continued, "Your incredibly prickly personality aside, Severus, I have known you too well over the years to believe that you would keep a scientific discovery of this magnitude to yourself." he actually gave me a bland smile. "I have therefore arranged for some extra equipment and a research allowance to help your work along. And the Ministry have always given a standing offer to help you financially or otherwise if you need it. Someone ought to be popping down shortly. Meantime I trust this catalogue may come in useful - you have authority to order anything you like from it, with the Ministry's approval. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to inspect a few classrooms before dinner."

Trust the old fellow - and my owl of demand will not even reach London before Wednesday.

* October 20th

The laboratory equipment I ordered from London has been installed today, and I hope to begin work on isolating a life-extension process for veritaserum immediately. I am banking on the information provided by several classified manuscripts the Ministry has released to me.

I have also had an owl from Remus - a rather lovely tawny creature with cool golden eyes. It delivered a large package which turned out to be, of all things... keepsakes.

There is a letter I foolishly wrote to him when I was called away and forced to leave him at our cottage for a week. Several books I bought for him, and inscribed to him. A collection of throwaway notes which I hadn't realized he'd kept. Most hurtful of all was the box containing the set of wristlets I'd given him for his twenty-fifth birthday - which had also been meant to be a financial security as they were of some value. I have decided to dispose of the whole lot.

"Dearest Remus,

It has only been three days since I've arrived in London, but I already am desperate to return to the cottage. The meetings here are far less important than they were made out to be, and I have little to do besides show my face at round-table "discussions" on the modern aspect of education. I amuse myself by scowling impressively at the head speaker while drawing pictures of you on my official notepad. Enclosed with kisses (the big Xs).

How have you been by yourself at the cottage? I hope you don't find it as lonely as I do here. I presume you've bought those new scrolls you were wanting from Bookwyrms. Don't go doing silly things such as spring-cleaning in my absence. I promised I would help you with that. Write back and tell me what you've been doing - and not just the "important" things, either. I miss the sound of your voice.

Today I had a little free time after lunch, and have noticed that the other delegates at the conference have been doing errands for their relatives and spouses. Some of them have bought enough to stuff a dragon. So I went out to Diagon Alley and picked up some little thing for you. To paraphrase Hagrid: I shouldn't have told you that, I suppose - it spoils the surprise. But then I'm not used to doing things like this, my angel. So don't be surprised. (Big Xs)

Speaking of picking up little things. While I was poking around one of the shops (I won't say in what part of town) - I happened to look out the display window and noticed that overbearing boor Cornelius Fudge standing on the street corner opposite. You remember Fudge from - that time, don't you darling? Anyway, to cut a long story short as I'm running out of this fancy hotel parchment - our red-blooded conservative upstanding married father of three was standing there in the high street trying to chat up a 16-year-old pretty boy.

I don't think I told that properly either. I'm not much of a raconteur, am I?

I can't write anymore because it just reminds me more of your absence. When I look up from the writing desk I see my nice clean white hotel double bed. The sight depresses me. Need I say that I have decided not to sleep until I return to our home, our bedroom... and your arms? Don't laugh. It's the only way I can think of to stay alive until next week.

Severus X"

"Darling,

Gone for walk on the other side of Burke's farm - didn't want to wake you. Breakfast under a cover on sideboard.

Love Severus 7.45 am"

"Remus: no more milk in pantry. Buy."

"Dear Remus,

If you're going to town, please purchase the following: 1. 3 boxes asphodel 2. 100g newts' eyes (fresh) 3. 1 bottle (10g) powdered lotus 4. 1 bunch St. John's wort 5. 1 refill tube Andrex (or more)

Love Sev"

"To My Darling Remus, with Love - and Apologies that You Had to Use my Copy for So Long."

* October 24th

I have decided to convert a portion of my laboratory into a sleeping area. It has become impossible to live upstairs in the first level dungeon for any length of time, as I have to conduct experiments and tests while still maintaining a full schedule of teaching. The Headmaster suggested I scale down the experiments, but that is a patently ridiculous suggestion to make - what else was the purpose of giving me the opportunity to carry out this research??

After some arguing he finally admitted as much, but ordered me to "stop sleeping on the workbench."

Which I was not doing in any case.

* November 18th

My experiments have been disrupted severely by sudden resumptions of activity on the part of Voldemort. To put it more succinctly, the bastard keeps ringing me up in the middle of the night and I'm expected to drop everything and run to him.

I suppose a soupcon of humour _may be permitted, since I'm still alive to tell of it._

I would rather not tell anything, though. I am very very tired - far more than I expected to be - and I am only able to write because I broke into the stores for a re-energizing potion. I should be able to function on this for long enough to do the written report to London, and then to put away my experiments.

I hope to God that I will actually sleep.

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There were no further entries in the diary for nearly a year. Seamus looked up from the little book, to catch Dean's eye. "I never knew he was like that." he said, softly.

"You mean about Remus? No, I didn't know he was capable of expressing such copious amounts of feeling." Dean replied, a trifle shortly.

Seamus flipped back to the "keepsakes" folded inside the diary, the scribbled notes and the torn flyleaf of "All Heart: the Inspirational True Story Behind 'Hairy Snout'" He touched the yellowing loveletter on hotel parchment. "You've not written me a letter like that once." he chided Dean, mischievously.

Dean pulled him nearer, pressed his face to Seamus' fair hair. "I've had you all these years, and not needed to wait for you. There's a difference."

"I'm not reading the rest." Seamus suddenly announced, breaking free of Dean's grasp and sitting up. He held up a good pinch of pages in the diary. "This bit. It's about Voldemort - and November that year, you remember, don't you, Dean? What happened."

"Of course I do." Dean said, watching him in puzzlement.

"I don't know what he went through." Seamus riffled through the diary, quickly, skipping the pages he had pointed out. "I don't want to know, God I swear I don't."

"Darling, it's all right. I told you you shouldnt have opened it in the first place." Dean reached for the book, taking it carefully from Seamus' nervous fingers.

"You're always right." Seamus looked away. "You read it if you want."

Giving him a curious look, Dean flipped the diary open to where the entries picked up again. The handwriting had changed noticeably since the last extract - it was flatter, less controlled, and often trailed off into nearly illegible scrawls, as if Snape's hand tired easily.

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August 23rd, 1997, he read. I am losing all semblance of sanity, and I cannot take it anymore. I would kill myself, except that this would create more problems than it solved for Dumbledore - and the rest of those animals I'm supposed to protect. I am plagued by Voldemort day and night, until I see him in the faces of all those around me, including those filthy students I teach. Migraines, fatigue, dehydration, all feature in my physical makeup. There is nothing I can use to relieve the constant pounding in my brain. Pain killers would unfortunately kill me, as well, so I take pain-sharpeners to keep my head clear. I concoct them myself in the potions lab, and this gives me something to do now that my veritaserum life-extension research has been taken over by the Ministry, and given to whichever of Fudge's cronies best stands to make profit from it. I no longer sleep, and my eyes hurt in strong light. I exist only to serve the purposes of either Voldemort or the Headmaster, I cannot remember which.

Remus is in Spain with Black. I hope my lord gets them both.

* Sept 9th Another little excursion into warfare with my lord and his friends. I only hope this time the Ministry doesn't bugger up everything and leave us with no one to kill - the last two raids were so obviously anticipated and such amazing failures that I have become more than merely suspect these days.

* Sept 10th A little stupidity is too much to ask, apparently.

* November 11th These are the people I have killed: Aidan Finnigan, Roy Keene, Ian Paisley, and several Aurors whose names escape me, but whose faces unfortunately never will. I wish I could tell the families something manly about their deaths but they all left this world screaming and begging.

I only wonder He left me in a piece.

* Seamus lifted his head from Dean's shoulder. "Does he mention Aidan?" he asked simply.

"Yes." Dean whispered.

Seamus exhaled audibly, letting Dean take his hand and stroke it comfortingly. "Brought it on myself, didn't I?" he asked, finally, with a slight smile.

Dean shook his head no. He raised his hand to brush the ugly tears from Seamus' face as the other man slid off the loveseat and onto the floor.

* November 14th 1998

I am becoming paranoid and over distractable. I have performed Avada Kedavra too many times. This morning I actually found myself setting a paper on "The 10 Inexcusable Potions: Uses in Relation to Lord Voldemort and the Political Will of Today's Government" for my first year's monthly tests.

* April 29th 1999

Now that I am able to write again, I am told by the Ministry that there is to be no more teaching for me until I am "fully healed". I would have laughed except that it was Remus who told me.

I am still ashamed of having been caught. I am still further ashamed of surviving milord's almighty wrath, when that innocent Finnigan boy did not and he - of all the ones I have killed - deserved to survive far more. He was only 23. His brother came to visit me the other day, and strangely enough did not seem angry. He came with Thomas, his inseparable companion, who - apropos of nothing - is growing into a very fine specimen. Neither of them, however, seem that way inclined.

One thing I am also ashamed of is that Pomfrey told me I called "incessantly" for Remus when I was first brought in. "You asked for him until it was no longer possible to ask." she explained to me, as to an idiot. "You wouldnt' cooperate with us until he arrived, which was the most foolhardy thing I've ever seen anyone do at death's door."

Regardless of the wisdom of my actions, Remus was there when I woke up. Admittedly, I did only wake up about three weeks later, but it still touched me inordinately that Remus would come for me when I wanted him. It touched me still deeper that his first action was to bend over and kiss me, and say that he was proud of me.

Black - and this was the part I relished most - was not there, as he was still at his post in Spain. Remus spent all of my first night of consciousness with me, holding me, and I can still feel it. He let me play with his beautiful soft brown hair. He treated me like a very precious newborn, and I feel somehow pleased and satisfied at the same time. Once I would have felt insulted.

But my pride has been beaten and bled out of me. I was truly unable to fend for myself properly, and there was no shame - and indeed a poetic justice - in Remus looking after me while I was incapacitated. Certainly I vastly preferred him to bathe me rather than Pomfrey! Remus has barely left my side all month. He even fed me the chocolates which - he said - were sent by sympathizers in and out of Hogwarts.

The painkillers and healing potions are affecting me badly - my thoughts and indeed my narration are disjointed, and I now have to fight an overwhelming sleepiness. But Remus is waiting for me and so I do not mind going to sleep.

* May 26th We progress nicely, according to Pomfrey and the visiting specialists. All my broken bones have knitted properly, my face is the right colour again, and I am able to walk without fainting.

Remus spends the afternoons lolling on my bed, reading aloud from "interesting" books he's picked out for me. I do not listen to the words, only to his marvellous voice. Sometimes I reach out and touch him, and he will fall silent.

The students visit regularly. Potter deigns to grace the sickroom with his presence on occasions when he is back from the front - and has said (graciously enough) that he is proud to have had me for a teacher. Neville Longbottom comes in like clockwork every weekday evening to sit near the bed and watch Remus and me talking. He often does some homework while he is here, and Remus will help him along, though he dares not ask me for any tips. Mundungus Fletcher is apparently the interim potions master, and while this would have sent me to my lab for an Inexcusable Potion in previous times - I only laugh nowadays.

Even Remus laughs when he sees what Mundungus is teaching the students. Suffice to say that Longbottom's marks have gone up.

* May 8th

They say Voldemort is close to the end. I am only sorry that I cannot be in at the death, and that my usefulness to my side has been limited. In fact, I nearly said as much to Fudge when he came to see me the other day.

Although I am said to be in danger from my former liege, and indeed enjoy the presence of a muscular Auxiliary Auror outside my chamber 24-7, I have been intrigued to discover that I am no longer concerned with my physical safety. My overwhelming feeling is one of relief to be free of the Dark Lord.

And a sort of delirious joy at being with Remus again - after a fashion.

To tell the truth, I do not care any longer what happens to me, so long as Voldemort is destroyed. I am still linked inextricably to him, and am occasionally jolted out of sleep by his calls. My brand still gives me physical pain, but has no more power to hurt my mind. And even the physical pain is easily dealt with by dragging Remus - to my side.

Whatever happens, I will either live safely through this time, or I shall be killed - neither prospect frightens me. It's enough to know that the children, however, will be safe.

--

I am turning into a dimwit - what appallingly trite catspiss. In any case I do not live for children alone.

* June 3rd

Even I have been startled by the speed at which milord has been dealt with. After 3 years of slaughter I certainly surmised that he would have fought much harder. Especially against Potter.

Sirius Black has returned to Hogwarts.

* June 4th

According to Sirius Black, a key factor in the eventual destruction of Voldemort was our increased ability to obtain information in the field, thanks to the new, longer-lasting strain of veritaserum. He told me that I should be proud of "my contribution" to the cause, which was both a frank compliment and a careful oversight of anything else I may have done for the cause. He was too busy cooing over his godson to listen to my retort.

In any case, I must pay my own compliments to the speed at which Black operates - tomorrow he and Remus go back to their home in London. He wishes to "recuperate" and there are urgent Ministry matters which he must attend to on Dumbledore's behalf. Which I don't doubt, but I had become used to Remus' presence again, after all these years.

It is strange how badly I feel now that the war is really and truly over. For me - and those of my generation - war has been the only reality we have known for most of our lives. War and fear. Now that there is finally no cause to be afraid, and no call to take up arms, we are bereft.

Soon after my interview with Black - if one could call it that - I went out to the lakeside for a while instead of joining the school for lunch. It was painful to feel that I should go back to a single definition of myself - "teacher" - and put away the layered identity I had crafted for myself out of war and fear. "Teacher/researcher/spy/madman" would have been more appropriate. "Almost-lover" was another one.

It is a terrible thing to be incapable of gratitude. I am set free - the Dark Mark burnt itself off my arm in the last moments of Voldemort's death agony, leaving only a silvery scar outlined on my skin. And yet I feel only emptiness, as though I had suffered loss instead of gaining freedom. I have no fulsome overflowings of the heart when I contemplate life without Voldemort. I feel nothing when I think of the Headmaster, and all the souls who reached down to lift me from the darkness I had chosen, and to return me to the living.

I stayed away from the victory celebrations all day and most of the night.

* June 10th

I will confess that there is something seriously wrong with me. I have been coping well with my recent absence of joie de vivre, but this has been possibly the worst moment of my career. As I took my 7th year class this afternoon, I opened my herbs encyclopaedia to show them a sample of Scandinavian liverwort. The book fell open instead at a page which Remus had marked with his handkerchief shortly before he left for London. The sight of it - and the scent of it, and the silky comforting feel of it in my hand as I removed it and disposed of it in the wastepaper basket actually made me want to put my head down on the desk and weep.

It was Longbottom, thankfully, who saved me, as he accidentally knocked over a full decanter of anti-drowning potion and scalded himself at that point.

Regardless of the interruption, I could barely finish the class coherently, and had to brew a healing potion to calm my nerves in the dungeon.

* June 12th

I have informed the headmaster of my psychological state and he has recommended several courses of action, viz. Seeing a healer and entering a course of medication. Ceasing to work for some time until I feel better. Formulating some plan of action by myself in order to combat this condition.

It would be easy - and indeed is highly tempting - to choose the second option, and simply take a holiday from work and the ever-endearing antics of my victory-mad students. Except that Mundungus Fletcher would probably be called in to replace me and I draw the line there.

The next best thing, in this case, is to form a plan of my own. Which I have done! It took me the better part of 10 minutes this morning as I changed into my teaching robes.

Resolved: I shall try to be a... _little... more cheerful._

* June 15th

It is impossible.

Just today I made some particularly cutting remark to Longbottom about his accident with the anti-drowning potion. I told Potter exactly what I thought of him and the autograph hunters. I punished about 6 students from the third year quite badly concerning an incident with a pixie and some growth potion. I handed out a month's detention to a 1st year who walked on the grass near the kitchen gardens.

I also kicked Filch's cat. Twice. Without regretting it.

Impossible.

* June 21st

I am trying my hardest to be "nicer" and less depressing with my students, and indeed my colleagues. McGonagall treats me as if I am dangerously ill, and is clearly puzzled (while the only thing which puzzles me is how she managed to be appointed deputy to Dumbledore). Sprout and Flitwick, on the other hand, have some kind of interest in my illness and apparently speculate on the cause of it when they are together.

But my mind is so preoccupied with the struggle to "be less temperamental" that it has actually been several days since I thought of him.

* July 2nd

It is a shame we are having our OWLS late this year, due to Voldemort. I struggle to keep my temper every night when conducting prep classes for the 7th years. They are so intellectually deficient! And the OWLS are sure to be tougher this year, out of sheer bloody perversity on the part of the examining board. I am predicting analytical questions on the History of Potions, which requires a half tonne of reading and memorizing.

* July 8th

There seems to be some progress. I have given a mock OWL in which all the papers exceeded the passing mark. Although this may be a sign that I am giving questions which are, in fact, far too soft. I intend to check through my past year questions analysis for the toughest possible topics.

...And Potter _smiled_ at me in class this morning.

Disgusting.

* July 29th The OWLS, thank God, are over. History of Potions did indeed come out, and I am cautiously confident of some decent marks when the results are published later this year. I did make an effort to say something encouraging to the class before the exams, to the effect that I was pleased with their progress and was (surprisingly) glad to have had the chance to teach them. Simple enough stuff, which I have heard my colleague say a hundred times each year.

But they seemed happy to hear it from me, and after the exams, some of them - including Potter and Granger - came up to me to ask if they might stay in touch after they had left Hogwarts.

I gave them my address in London.

* October 4th

The Ministry has released my research papers back to me. It has taken nearly three months of wrangling to obtain my papers - despite the fact that my copyright and right of control over them were stated in my original agreeement with the MoM.

I intend to go to London during the long "victory" break (I am excessively tired of hearing the word, and it is popping up on everything from commemorative scrolls to magical underwear). I will have all the time I want to collate and revise my papers before undertaking - somehow and somewhere - to have them published.

I will also have time to prepare my teaching agenda for next year... as that bastard Fudge has decided to fend off well-deserved criticism of the education system by introducing an experimental new syllabus.

I foresee a very long and tiresome end to the Year of Voldemort.

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"There's a whole year missing. The whole of 1999." Dean said, curiously.

"He's making me sleepy." Seamus murmured. He put his head down on Dean's stomach, and rubbed it slowly.

"Oh no, here it is. It's a separate section at the back." Dean picked up a thick sheaf of diary pages.

"What happened in 1999?" Seamus wondered.

"We went to university." Dean said. "Snape taught experimental syllabus at Hogwarts."

"Nothing interesting. Skip on to 2000 - that was a strange sort of year."

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January 2nd 2000

I spent New Year's in London with Remus and Black.

Remus came to visit me last month when he heard tht I was in London, and the memory of his visit still pains me. But he did ask me to come and see him and Black.

And, for reasons that I cannot fully explain even now, I did.

Remus and Black live in a very quiet neighbourhood in Kensington, in a rather old but dignified double-storey Queen Anne house. Black's inheritance has been restored to him, finally, and there are any number of renovations, restorations, and remodeling which help make the house very agreeable indeed inside. There is a large, somewhat unruly garden at the back, and the furnishings are comfortable, if not exactly elegant. It is the kind of place you could imagine a man wanting to come home to.

Each man has a separate and very large study - Black's, for obscure reasons, is done along the lines of a naval officer's cabin, and features ostentatious helpings of oak and pinewood fittings. Remus' is slightly shabby, haphazardly furnished, and far more comfortable. His fondness for antique books is clearly indulged and is evident throughout the house. He has acquired a new copy of "All Heart: the Inspirational True Story Behind 'Hairy Snout'" though.

I cannot say my stay was unpleasant. Black kindly refrained from coming near Remus in my presence, and expressed his hospitality by cooking furiously for us during my visit. Remus was his old self - poised, unfazed, warmly cheerful and a little sad. Though it pains me to notice it, he seems safe and desperately content with Black.

On my first day, Remus and Black took me out to lunch at something called The Madrasserie. It turned out to be a "surprise party" at which half a dozen other guests also appeared, among them Mundungus, Arabella Figg, Charles Malfoy (who calls himself Charles MacIlvoy because he married a Muggle), one of the older, better-looking Weasleys, and other assorted acquaintances of my hosts. Of course, I was forced to be polite to all these buggers, and spent an entire afternoon listening to tedious banter and enduring reunion-style hi-jinks on the part of the younger men. The only thing that made the lunch worthwhile was the extremely spicy South Indian curry and the mango chutney. While I do relish the taste of Asian food, it had to be noted that Black spent more time spluttering than spooning up his curry.

After lunch, Remus took me off to meet a few more of his friends at the university department where he now works, and gave me a very pleasant tour of the libraries and research facilities. The sight of him smiling at me over the books was something nearly unbearable, for all Remus' supposed happiness with Black has still not quenched that veiled pensiveness that sometimes enters his eyes. I wanted to speak of it, impulsive as it sounds, but somehow couldn't find the proper opening. In any case, we had barely drunk a cup of tea together at the university cafe before Black came rushing in very anxious to get us home to freshen up before our dinner party at his club. After that, I had practically no time to myself - or to spend with Remus - as both halves of this affectionate couple have been dragging me about to meet friends and influence people.

The upshot of all this socializing is that I spent New Year's with a goodlooking young fellow by the name of Darius, whom I met in the club which we had celebrated New Year's in. He is very young, and is obviously not about to become anything more than an unexpected pleasure - but he is a pleasure nevertheless. One I certainly hadn't been expecting.

Another thing I certainly hadn't been expecting in that rather sophisticated and very gay nightclub was the sight of - Neville Longbottom.

The boy who had used to be the bane of my classroom was standing rather nervously in a corner near the bar, and gazing out at the crowded, fairy-lit dancefloor. He was wearing a new-looking navy robe with silver thread along the collar and sleeves, and his fair hair was actually combed and neat. The fellow looked presentable for the first time in my experience.

Of course, when I touched him on the shoulder, he went nearly white with shock, and knocked his drink over onto the floor. "Professor Snape." he choked out, eventually.

"Yes." I said, unhelpfully. "Me."

"-What are _you_ doing here?" he asked, in unflattering astonishment.

"I'm celebrating - if that's the word - the impending new year." I explained kindly. "And what are _you doing in this place?"_

Longbottom went a fetching shade of red and mumbled something.

"What's that?" I asked.

"Just came to see a friend." he said, lying through his even little white teeth.

"That's good. I came with Professor Lupin and Sirius Black." I told him. "They're over there on the floor, I think. You must join us."

Longbottom looked as though he would rather die first. To keep him from bolting, I called the bartender over and bought us a drink. I have to admit I was somewhat taken aback by the easy way Longbottom put his vodka and orange down.

I attempted to make small talk with him, but he was distracted and still nervous. So, to tell the truth, was I. It is always disconcerting to meet in an impartial, social environment the young adults whom you still think of as grubby first years. Longbottom was as tall as me, his youthful chunkiness transformed into proper weight. Growth and physical maturity had brought out the cast of his face, and he was altogether a very pleasant-looking young man - except for his irritating tendency to stare at his feet, to say nothing of his stammer and constant desire to blush. All I managed to get out of him was the fact that he was home for the summer break, was living with his granny in SW1, and is halfway through a course at the highly prestigious Herbology Institute at Geneva.

Anyway, when I spotted Remus and Sirius Black, I waved to get their attention, indicating my young friend beside me, but when I turned round, the silly ass had panicked, and was disappearing toward the exit.

Shortly after that I bumped into Darius at the bar, and he promptly put Longbottom out of my mind for the rest of the evening, and indeed the year. He is half-French, and 28, and I am not quite sure which of these two facts is more attractive.

Sirius Black, of course, was desperately happy for me, and Remus gave me a very odd smile - warm and sympathetic, but with more than a tinge of disconcertment. It was only much later that I realized that in all our lives, Remus has never seen me even touch another man.

Considering what he must have seen me do with Darius just after midnight and indeed half the way home, I should have felt burning shame and misery. But the only feeling that springs to mind, with the beautiful Darius stretched out and snoring beside me in the guest bedroom... is deep amusement. Both at my discarding of dignity last night and at the chagrin my werewolf must have felt to see it.

Poor Remus.

* February 18

I have been making considerable progress with my collating and revision efforts. Cross-references and corrections are taking up so much of my time that I have been forced to extend my stay in London. Needless to say, I have parted company with Remus and Black. Agreeable though my visit was, I could not have stayed for a moment longer in their house, and endured the aura of possession and of belonging that permeates their home. I have moved from my old place, and found a small flat of my own for the moment. It's very convenient - near to all amenities, such as the library, the university, and Hampstead Heath.

I work quietly in the front room for the most part, and Darius - beautiful Darius - goes out to his job in the City (something fancy at Gringotts, though I am unsure whether it is related to his degree in Wizard Economics. With his looks he could be the Chief Goblin's favourite teaboy, for all I know).

There is also the matter of the "updated" new syllabus introduced for Hogwarts. Dumbledore has sent us long and detailed owls explaining the changes to our still-experimental system, but he also advises us to prepare our lessons as we see fit, and to ignore anything too outre in the suggested lesson plans. On that basis, I shall have to throw away 95% of the potions lesson plans - and dearly wish I could. Instead, I meekly haunt Bookwyrms for the recommended texts, and spend precious hours every evening making out my timetable. When I could be making out something else.

* February 24

I had an unexpected visitor today. Longbottom, my erstwhile drinking companion, came to see me on private matters.

Which turned out to be as follows: He wished to clarify our meeting at the nightclub on New Year's Eve. He was very silly, and wished to apologize for his conduct. At the time, he had been visiting establishments such as the Silver Flask nightclub for recreational sightseeing purposes. Just prior to New Year's Eve, however, he had received advice from certain friends (whom he declined to name and who had brought him to my flat) that he should take a more active role in any situations which might arise from his visits. Hence, acting upon this advice, he had turned up at the Silver Flask ready to take a more proactive stance with regard to other visitors.

Unfortunately he ran into his bloody much-loathed ex-teacher out on exactly the same desperate quest, and as a result of the encounter little Neville lost all stomach for getting laid on New Year's.

Hence the hurried departure.

I had such a hard time keeping a straight face throughout this solemn discussion that it was a wonder I still have a jaw. I told Neville that it was perfectly alright, he was only doing what he felt to be best under the circumstances. I told him that being proactive was the best way to discover what it was he wanted in his life. In fact, I said (rather too expansively), out of that New Year's encounter of ours, I had found personal delight in a new relationship, and added a few appreciative words about Darius.

The poor fellow looked so shocked by the idea of Snape in a Relationship, that I had to get him a cup of tea to restore him to sanity.

After a bit he mustered a vapid smile and said something "how nice for me". I was forced to joke with him a little before he would admit that the news wasn't what he would have expected. Then - before I knew what was happening, he began to guffaw with laughter: he clutched his face, fell over on the sofa, and laughed so hard I would hardly have been human not to join in.

From time to time he gasped out, "Oh, professor, I'm sorry. I'm sorry." but it got him nowhere. "It's just the idea - that and the things we thought about you in first year." he explained eventually, overcome on the sofa pillows. "It was too ridiculous for words. I'm sorry."

I smiled at him. "Don't be. I dare say I brought it on myself."

Longbottom grew quiet. "No, not really. You were just doing things your own way."

There was a little wriggle of internal discomfort at that, but I turned the conversation to more pleasant matters, and we ended up talking for nearly an hour about his herbology studies and the current theories on raising magical plants. He is very knowledgeable for his age, and has apparently - in the years since leaving school - discovered a busily inquiring and analytical mind inside that skull of his. Meanwhile I hear that Potter is suffering some problems with his tutors at the Auror's Academy - and Granger has elected to take a sabbatical from her own studies (this last, though, hardly surprising as she is attempting three degrees and a master's simultaneously).

Longbottom was a delightful mixture of youth and maturity, amusing and incisive in his own clumsy way, and I was rather sorry to see him go, as I had nearly forgiven him for his earlier outbursts. I should make more contact with these ex-students of mine. If I knew how. I can hardly go round seeking them out in gay nightspots.

Speaking of which, a short note before I rest my hand and Darius finishes setting the dinner table. While I was in the kitchen getting the cups and saucers, I happened to look out of the windows into the street. Sure enough, the nameless and helpful friends of Longbottom's were sitting on a bench under the lamp post, waiting for their protege. They were canoodling intensively to pass the time. Finnigan, in fact, has turned out to be just as fine a specimen as Thomas.

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"We're mentioned." Dean said, smiling. "And Snape likes the way you look. He considers you a fine specimen."

"You don't say." Seamus opened his eyes, and raised himself on one elbow. He glanced at the relevant page. "How incredibly embarrassing."

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* June 26

I have turned in my paper - after one year's worth of revision - to the Potions Scientist journal, and not surprisingly they have accepted it for publication next month. This ought to be a great moment in my professional life, but I must admit I am not as enthusiastic about it as I might have been.

For one thing my preparations for the new term are not finished yet, and there is a deal more work to be done. I have yet to schedule in the new Herbo-Potions classes, which are meant to be subsidiary to both Herbology and Potions.

And Darius will not be accompanying me to Scotland. For one thing there is his job as assistant to Gringott's international trade consultant. For another he cannot tolerate the weather up north. We say we will take things one step at a time and see what happens - but it is obvious that our "unexpected pleasure" is ending quite as expected.

I for one am not sorry. Darius is marvellously goodlooking, and full of languorous youth - but he is not free of the wretched egotism that accompanies his power, and he is, when all is said and done, still only twenty-eight. Impossible that anyone of that generation could find it in themselves to tolerate a fifty one year old ex-bastard like me.

I wish my beautiful boy happiness. I like to think he cured me of Remus, whom I can now kiss, without a trace of pain, in Black's presence, before I leave for Hogwarts. Certainly, though, in the course of six months he has helped rid me of some of my disgust for public affection - and that is no small feat.

* July 2

I have just heard that I am nominated for a Golden Phial award for the veritaserum research.

* August 2

Two letters marked my day today, else I would not have bothered writing in this diary, being so fully occupied with school prep - and the proposal I have received from Obscurus Publishing to write a book on potions distillation.

One was from the Golden Phial committee, saying that I had not won the award. As I was fully expecting this, I was fortunate not to be disappointed. What, after all, is veritaserum lifespan compared to the invention of a new potion (the "Animuggle" potion, is, I believe, its name) that promises to make millions of knuts in commercial profit for jokeshops by changing hapless Muggles into various species of wildlife?

The second letter is from Neville Longbottom. I have read it through twice and I am at a loss to describe it. Somehow I feel, in a way, that I understand what Longbottom is trying to convey in his brief, but intense manner. But I am far from sure that my intuition is correct in this. And I do not know what the appropriate response should be.

"Dear Severus,

I write because I feel you should be the first person to know about this matter, as it concerns your work. The Headmaster has invited me to take up the new Herbo-Potions class starting next term at Hogwarts.

As this is a subsidiary subject, I will therefore need to work closely with you (and Professor Sprout) to ensure the Herbo-Potions lessons complement your own teaching topics.

I am a herbologist by training and don't like the idea of a hybrid class such as Herbo-Potions. I'm sure you don't either. But I'm taking the class for a simple and perhaps really naive reason which I hope will not cause you offence.

I want to work with you. I want to work with you very much. I hope you'll understand if I say that it is all I care about in taking up this post (well, nearly all).

I will be arriving in Hogwarts on September 1 prior to beginning the new term. Would be very glad if I could see you then.

With deepest and warmest regards from Neville"

*August 3 

This morning as I engaged in my early shower, I couldn't help noticing that the burnt-out scar of the dark mark still disfigures the skin of my upper arm. It has not faded as a normal scar would. Branded for life.

Would anyone, I wondered, running an experimental finger over the indents and ridges, truly want something like this? Was it possible, if you were a normal wizard, to overlook the huge defect that this scar represented, in a partner?

Remus had been the only person to acknowledge both my brand and myself, as part of the same package. But he was Remus, the exception rather the norm. Darius had spent six months simply pretending the scar didn't exist. He never kissed me on that arm, and always looked through the scar if it was on display.

It was all very well to want something badly, to lust for something on an intellectual level. But it is a very dark, very deep valley which separates the physical reality of living with another person from appreciating their latest piece of research, or their last article in the Potions Scientist.

And yet it is flattering. And it is so ridiculously unexpected.

And it makes, at an emotional, irrational level, a strange kind of sense. It also explains a great deal, in very few words.

Put simply, I cannot deny that I want to be adored for my nomination to the ranks of the Golden Phial. But I am - contrary to gossip in certain quarters - a man, and it hurts me not to have my scar kissed and touched sometimes.

I think I understand what Neville is trying to say. But I'm not sure I understand my own reply.

* Sept 2 1999 

Neville's strange letter has so occupied my mind that I barely realized that that the beginning of term had arrived. However, I awaited the arrival of the Hogwarts Express this year with no small degree of equanimity, despite his letter. Even despite the brief note I received two days ago saying that he would be coming up from London on the local train, before the children arrived.

There is nothing like work to clear your mind.

In the space of just one month, August, I prepared my lesson plans; worked out my schedule for the year; planned further laboratory adventures into potion lifespans; and have negotiated a contract with Obscurus and begun work on the first draft of "Distillation of Secondary-Level Herbal Ingredients: An Advanced Potions Text".

In the course of that month, it gradually became obvious to me how I should reply to Neville, and even the reasons why.

So that yesterday morning when I stood on the stone platform at Hogwarts, waiting for the local to pull into the station, there were no last-minute panics, no arguing with myself until I argued my way out of the station and back to the dungeons.

There was only calm, the peace of pure conviction. Even, I openly admit, a thrill of eagerness to set eyes on Neville again. I breathed the chill morning air with anticipation, and with an almost painful determination to say my piece and stick to it.

The train slid slowly up to the platform, and I scanned its streaked windows for any sight of Neville - I caught a first glimpse of his profile as he lifted his bags down from the overhead compartment. There was still no feeling of welcome, or of delight, or of fear, in my gut. Neville shouldered the heavy carriage door open and - glancing up quickly into my face - stepped off the train and onto the stone paving of the platform, pulling his bags with him.

We stood just half a metre apart - Neville tall and fetching in dark robes, I stoop-shouldered, middleaged and calm. I opened my mouth to give him his answer, tell him what I wanted to say.

Absobloodylutely f***all came out of my gob. I _forgot_ the god damned speech.

What I shall not forget is the increasingly puzzled and then alarmed look on Neville's face as he stood there staring at me.

Instead, I leaned down, picked up his bags, and marched right out of the station, followed by my still somewhat bemused darling.

I will never live this down.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

"Snape's diary." Dean said. "There's some more," he added, flipping through the later entries. "Mainly pretty uninhibited stuff about - er - Neville. And then lunch appointments, and some reminders about functions and meetings.... look we're mentioned again, as a reminder to buy a house-breaking gift."

Seamus withdrew the diary from Dean's fingers and tossed it onto the floor.

"Give some respec, man." Dean said. "You just read the intimate unburdenings of Severus Snape. And it wasn't a joke either."

"Did you expect that?" Seamus asked, lifting himself against Dean's stomach, his green eyes serious.

"What?" the other man glanced down at the fallen diary. "That?"

"No." Seamus gave an impatient gesture. "For Snape's diary to be a lovestory."

Dean smiled. "No, not really." he reached up to touch Seamus' warm cheek. "It was - very affecting, you know. That Snape feels things so differently from us."

"I thought the love bits were very boring." Seamus said, opening those wicked green eyes wide.

"Really?" Dean inquired, in hushed tones. "How terrible."

Seamus fell upon the other man's neck, pressing his face, his mouth against the firm curve of Dean's throat and jaw. His fingers curled in Dean's dark hair.

"We'll have to do the memory spell now, Seamus." Dean said, from under him. "Just a friendly reminder... oh Lord."

Seamus was clearly in no mood for memory spells. "Why," he demanded quite seriously. "Are you wearing this undershirt?"

"Because... don't _do_ that." Dean replied, distractedly. "...Because I wasn't - _Seamus_ - I suppose I just wasn't -"

"Wasn't what?" Seamus insisted, with his mouth full of buttons.

Dean's eyes closed in an expression of mingled frustration and laughter. "Expecting this."


End file.
